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The latest expansion – EVE Online: Retribution – is due to land on our computers on December 4th, bringing new ships, revised bounty mechanics and new UI elements. Below is a list of all the known changes with links to the full details.

Crimewatch 2.0

A much needed overhaul of the overly complicated Crimewatch system is coming this Winter. The gist of it is as follows: There are 3 “flags” – Weapons, Suspect and Criminal.

A Weapons flag is activated whenever you use an offensive module and lasts 1 minute from last activation. This prevents docking and jumping. You also cannot eject or swap ships with this in effect.

A Suspect flag is created either by Killrights (more below), stealing from a wreck or can and engaging a ship in Lowsec. This allows ANY player to attack you, but there is no CONCORD intervention.

A Criminal flag is created by unlawful aggression in Highsec or killing a Capsule in Lowsec. This generates a Killright (more below) and allows CONCORD to engage you in highsec, as well as other players like the Suspect flag.

Assisting anyone with a flag (like using Remote Repair) also causes you to share the “target’s” flags – meaning if I repair a Hurricane with 30 seconds left to dock, I also cannot dock for 30 seconds. If I assist a suspect, I also get the suspect flag. If I assist a Criminal, I explode in Highsec.

In addition, being aggressed by an NPC gives you an “NPC” flag which causes your ship to stay in space for 15 minutes after log-off – much like today’s normal aggression flag.

Bounty Hunting changes

Retribution will introduce a new bounty system, allowing players to place bounties on Characters, Corporations and Alliances. A percentage of the total bounty is then awarded for any ship or pod kill of the target, with the payout proportional to the amount of ISK destroyed. The Dev Blog is here. This ties in with…

Killright changes

In the Bounty change devblog, Killrights are having an overhaul. Killrights are now awarded for any criminal action; Suicide gank in highsec (failed or not), and podding in lowsec. Killrights can be “activated” to give the target a 15 minute “Suspect” flag during which time anyone can shoot at them.

These killrights can also be sold to other players – a player flying near a player with a killright for sale has the option to buy and activate the killright, allowing anyone to attack that player for 15 minutes. This is included in the dev blog for the bounty changes here.

New User Interface

CCP are working (this is very much still design phase) on a new User Interface – namely based around the targeting panes. Dev blog here.

Faction Warfare rebalancing

Faction Warfare right now is kind of very broken. As a result, CCP are pushing out changes to Tier levels and introducing some new features, such as the ability to place Cyno Jammers in Tier 5 systems. Dev post here.

This also includes a change to the FW NPC and Complex mechanics – see here.

NPC Rebalance

NPCs in all areas of space will now switch targets. This is affected by both ship size (NPC frigates are more likely to shoot player frigates) and threat levels (ECM and RR give higher threat). Dev blog here.

Market changes

CCP are adding new items to market – allowing the listing of items such as faction Drones, Outpost construction eggs and more. See here for the full list.

Rumored upcoming changes

We’re still a way out from the expansion, so expect this list to get a lot longer. There’s rumors floating round of some of the other changes, currently including:

EWAR rebalancing

Contract Changes

As always, check back here for updates and let me know if you see anything I missed.

It’s time for Ganked 12! Rifters are a go! Well, Rifter hulls. This means Wolfs, Jaguars and Frekis (lol) are a go as well!

We’re forming up in Stacmon – we plan to hit Syndicate tonight, but there’s an Agony Unleashed frigate class also departing from here. We’re planning to engage them and see what happens.

I have decided upon a VagaWolf as my ship of choice, with a Rifter as a backup ship for when I die. Tonights naming scheme for the fleet is, oddly enough, “tgl3’s rifter”

The irony is my own ship is actually called "HMS TurretStorm"

The fleet, as usual, is forming up over an hour before the Ganked roam actually starts, resulting in general asshat-ness on comms. Which is fine.

Rifters, with a side order of Rifters.

The Agony fleet had already set out but returned after about an hour roaming. Hopefully they’ll head out again as we do.

Eventually 2100 rolls round and we’re off to the nearby lowsec!

A trio of Battleships are waiting for us in a lowsec system off gate, and as we burn to them they, shockingly, engage smartbombs. We’re wise to that though, and hold at range. However, they’ve all fit full warp core stabilsiers and all warp off, without a kill to either side.

Jumping into the Nullsec system of MHC-R3 reveals the Agony gang in system, but also a random Tempest off gate. Our lone interceptor burns for him and the rest of us warp up. Boom. Didn’t kill a soul.

We’re waiting on stragglers before we run at Agony, who have told us they’re at the Sun. Whilst we’re all fielding Rifter hulls and are planning to order targets alphabetically, Mangala informs us that Agony like to call targets separately for each squad. We seem to have numbers, but Agony are also fielding frigates with ewar and drones.

Eventually we get underway again, when the Agony Class reports a couple of carriers about!

We wait nearby while the Agony group try to bait the Carriers into attacking, but an hour (!) of waiting gives us nothing so we continue on.

At this point, I’m feeling quite ill, so I have no choice but to log out for the night and try to sleep. Apparently, not a lot happened afterwards (the Ganked gang leeroy’d into a Razer gang and died, it seems)